


Against the Night

by songsmith



Category: Chronicles of Narnia (Movies), Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: AU, M/M, NFE 2012
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-08
Updated: 2012-09-08
Packaged: 2017-11-13 19:07:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/506729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/songsmith/pseuds/songsmith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In some universe, they are together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Against the Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [m3535](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=m3535).



At night, I gather the images in my mind: 

Of a soldier, weary of the road, who draws his horse to a wayside inn. Dismounting, he flips the stableboy a coin, and goes inside. Light and noise spill in a yellow stretch across the stones from the open door. And within, the air is heavy with heat and smoke, with the scent of ale and meat and unwashed bodies. He pushes back his hood; the torches catch on his hair, sparking gold.

Across the room, through the haze he spies a familiar figure. A man like himself with the sword callus on his palms and the tracery of white scars on his knuckles. He has seen this man in battle— sometimes beside him, sometimes opposing him — as the fortunes of war shift by the whim of kings. But tonight they are not with the armies, and their swords sleep in their sheaths. He takes the chair across from his fellow. Lays a coin on the table. The barmaid materializes as if by magic; the silver vanishes the same way. Then there is ale, rich on his tongue, and his fellow laughs.

“You have been long in the saddle, to drink this swill like nectar,” he says. His teeth flash white against his golden-tanned skin, another man more often outdoors than in.

“Four days ride,” the soldier says, “early up again tomorrow.”

“Then drink better tonight,” his fellow replies, and calls for wine, good Narnian wine, from the heavy purple vines of summer. They tap cups in an ironic toast to the confusion of their enemies —whoever those may be today, tomorrow. They drink, pouring turn and turn about, while the hour grows later, the air grows thicker, the fire grows lower. 

Muzzy-headed, he says, “I must sleep.”

“You’ve left it too late. The rooms will all be taken.”

He has coin; the innkeeper will find a bed for a soldier of the realm.

His fellow says, “Share mine.”

They climb the leaning stairs together, swaying with the pitch and roll of the suddenly seaborne inn. The room is small beneath the eaves, but the night comes drifting through the unshuttered window. He breathes deep, expelling the smoke of downstairs, taking in a different sort of wine.

They shed clothing into piles on the floor and do not bother to turn away. Modesty is a luxury long since abandoned. He admires the hard angles of his fellow’s body. They are getting old, for soldiers, the time of life when many men go to seed and the muscle of youth slumps into the old veteran’s paunch. But neither of them has succumbed to that yet; it is pleasant to see another who keeps his discipline, when so many comrades look for softer living.

“The bed is not too narrow for two,” and they lie down together, curled together hip to hip in the confines of the cot.

There is nowhere to put his arms but around his fellow, and he in turn is embraced. Beneath his finders he feels the tight, hot knot of overworked muscle; he rubs gentle circles to loosen it. His fellow sighs and settles deeper into the bed.

Hands exploring further, he maps the landscape of scars. This one, on the thigh, he knows this, he saw it taken, a lucky ogre not so lucky moments later. This ridge along a rib, this is a mystery, and he traces the dips and puckers of it, measuring, counting stitches in his head. A sword? An axe? A creature’s foul tooth or claw?

“A shovel,” his fellow murmurs, warm breath stirring his hair. “Fell into it setting up camp in the pissing rain.”

He chuckles, lets his hands drift on. He had his own share of ignoble scars. There are better ways to tease tonight. And clearly he is not the only one with such pastimes on his mind. Lips touch his ear; teeth tug gently at the lobe.

They have done this before, though rarely with the luxury of a real bed beneath them. Long and lingering for warmth, huddled in leaky tents on long late-season campaigns, or fast and hard in the aftermath of battle for the sheer joy of being alive. Tonight, perhaps somewhere in between: slowly heating.

Neither of them are in a hurry yet, content to share kisses back and forth, to sweep palms across muscle and to suck marks into one another’s skin. They have all night — he has given up on sleep now; the haze of wine has passed from his mind and the night air sings in his lungs. He is wide awake, alert, and hungry.

But he soon has cause to wish he had taken less wine. There are consequences to too much drink other than the fog, and they fumble with sweat and spit to wake the foolish body, disobedient to the mind that pulses with desire. Finally, finally, a stirring. He rolls them over, draws his fellow’s weight atop him, a living blanket pressing him solidly into the bed. 

He reaches down, curls his hand around them both — careful, they have no oil, drunkenness makes poor planning — and for a time there is only the thrust and slide and the heat building everywhere. They lose their rhythm, forget their care; his hand tightens, heedless of the soreness the morrow may bring, knowing only that he needs more —

Hard mouth against his, no gentleness left in either of them. Hungry kisses that knock their teeth against one another in their haste, little nips that have more bite than kiss about them. His fellow cries out his name, once, again, and he — and he—

And I wake sighing in a tangle of sticky sheets, alone. I roll onto my back, stare out the window at stars just fading in the light of dawn, and know the truth. We cannot be other than what we are: two kings separated by a thousand years and a single door, until we meet again in Aslan’s Country.

**Author's Note:**

> From the Narnia Fan Fiction Exchange 2012
> 
> Original Prompt was:
> 
> What I want: Either of these three:  
> 1\. AU - as in Narnia doesn't exist. Peter/Caspian (or Edmund/Caspian if you prefer).  
> 2\. AU - in Narnia. No one is royal. Peter/Caspian (or Edmund/Caspian if you prefer).  
> 3\. Crossover with Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. Caspian. Doesn't have to be slash.  
> Prompt words/objects/quotes/whatever: -  
> What I definitely don't want in my fic: Incest. Unhappy ending. Religious undertones (that means not a lot of Aslan).


End file.
